The Summon

Aidora's POV

“For how long are you going to lay there?” The question was accompanied by a sick kick to the stomach and I hunched over as the pain spread through my stomach. 

I didn't get a chance to get accustomed to the roaring pain before my hair was grabbed and I was dragged across the floor. My eyes fluttered close and I braced myself for the pain that was burning through my skin. 

I couldn't heal fast and I couldn't endure pain like the others. My wolf was weak, way too weak, and everyone took advantage of it. It seemed like a curse from the Moon Goddess, like she too was punishing me for the crimes levied against my parents.

As they dragged me across the floor mercilessly, my wolf shrunk even further into my mind.

To them, they were doing the pack a favour by ensuring the daughter of traitors endured pain every waking moment.

A rancid smell hit my nose, and my eyes instantly snapped open. It took a minute for me to register the scene before me, but the second it did, my eyes widened and I began thrashing around.

“No! Please! Stop!” I cried with my broken voice, trying to break free from their grasps. I could endure anything but that.

They laughed at my struggles. Suddenly, they stopped and released me. 

“You have five seconds to make it out of here.”

I knew they were only teasing me, I couldn't make it out in five seconds, but still, I tried. My legs were far too weak to carry me out, so I crawled.

The silence behind me was deafening, but I didn't stop even for a moment. Even when I left traces of blood as I crawled, and it got harder to breathe, I still continued.

Just when I neared the edge of my freedom, someone kicked me hard, and I dropped on the floor, hitting my head hard, then I heard them burst into laughter.

Black dots clouded my vision, and tears pooled in my eyes.

I was exhausted.

With no time to pull myself together, they dragged me from the floor and headed back to that rancid toilet that had been unwashed in what felt like forever.

This time around, even with the stench stinging my eyes and nose, I did not attempt to fight back. I let them drag me along.

One of them grabbed me by the neck and began pushing my head slowly towards the toilet, like every second she spent slowly torturing me, added more time to her life.

“Making you feast on feces is still nothing compared to what your parents did to this pack! Children died because of them!”

Her hold on me tightened, but before she could plant my face into that pile of dung, someone walked in.

“What is going on here?!” The voice bounced off the wall, a clear indicator he wasn't a prisoner, and my torturer immediately let go of me.

I would have still ended up face deep into the dung if I didn't pull myself back.

“Just teaching Sinclair a lesson.” 

There was a note of pride in her voice, and of course, the guard simply nodded at her words.

“Enough of that! All of you should return to your bunks.” 

They all filed out, leaving just I and the guard. “I should have come in a second later,” he said loud enough for me to hear, and the tear I'd been holding back escaped and slid down my cheek.

“But that's fine. Get yourself cleaned up,” he tossed a piece of cloth at me, “the council has summoned you.”

“What?” 

My stomach clenched so tight it felt like my organs were being squeezed. “What did you just…”

A hard smack against the cheek cut me off.

“Get yourself cleaned up, I'll be back in a minute to take you. You have been summoned.”

Summoned? After 14 years?

The scream that filled the air as they dragged me away that cold night, my pleas, flashed through my mind. 

I grazed my bottom lip hard.

 I was just a child then, yet they didn't hear me out. They didn't pity me. They dumped me in a prison with adults who wanted nothing but to tear me apart.

Now, they want to summon me?

“Take me like this.” I said before the guard could walk away

“What?”

“Take me like this. There is no need to clean up.”

If I was being summoned, what was the point of cleaning up just to get soiled again? I would go like this, then maybe, they'll see that I have suffered enough.

I could plead my case.

“You want to go before the Council, the alpha! Like that?!”

I flinched when he said Alpha, and I almost changed my mind. Appearing filthy before him, before Hadrian, seemed excessive. A part of me wanted to appear better, but no amount of cleaning would make him see me any less of a traitor.

He had been there that night, and he hadn't flinched as he watched them drag me away.

Swallowing, I nodded shakily, and a sinister smile appeared on the guards face

“Very well then. It might hasten your sentence.” He placed cuffs on my hand and forced me to my feet. “Keep up.” 

He marched forward with zero consideration for my broken body. To keep up, I had to jog, and every step I took had me close to tumbling to the floor.

As we walked past the others, they hurled insults, spit and anything they could find at me. I kept my head low and took it all. Whatever my sentence was I was confident it wouldn't result in me coming back to this prison. I won't let it happen, even at the cost of my life